Dr. William Cast: 'It is a chance to give back what the school has given me'

Dr. William Cast spent 40 years serving the community.\nHe saved lives on the operating table, gave time to his country as a surgeon during the Vietnam War and helped found a major hospital and a K-12 school. \nNow Cast has been asked to serve again.\nA resident of Fort Wayne, he was appointed this July by Gov. Mitch Daniels to the nine-member IU board of trustees to fulfill a three-year term. \n"My name was put up, and I was asked if I would serve," Cast said. "And I told them I would be delighted to serve. It is a chance to give back what the school has given me: an education and a profession."\nAttending IU just as the football stadium was being constructed, Cast began as a chemistry major in 1955 before being accepted to the School of Medicine three years later. During his education at IU, Cast also served as the president of his fraternity, Sigma Nu. \n"Bill Cast was an excellent choice," said current IU trustee and fellow member of Sigma Nu, Pat Shoulders. "Our IU Medical School is so important to our University. It is good to have two doctors on our board."\nAfter graduating and completing his residency at the University Medical Center, Cast joined the Army during the Vietnam War. Stationed at Fort Jackson in South Carolina, an orthopedic trauma center at the time, Cast served as a head and neck surgeon.\nFollowing his tenure in the Army, he started Ear, Nose, & Throat Specialists, a private practice in Fort Wayne, where he has practiced since 1969. Expanding his medical career even further, Cast led a group of physicians along with the Lutheran Hospital Group to found Dupont Hospital in Fort Wayne. Becoming the founding chairman when the hospital opened in 2001, Cast served in that position until the end of 2004. \n"Gov. Daniels could not have made a wiser choice than Dr. Cast," said Dupont Hospital CEO Dr. Mike Schatzlein. "He is truly a renaissance man with broad interests and is very knowledgeable about medicine and education." \nDespite his deep commitment to the field of medicine, Cast also has strong roots in education. His father was a superintendent of schools, and Cast said he always had a strong interest in the educational process. In 1977, he was part of a group that founded Canterbury School, a K-12 school located in Fort Wayne. Cast currently serves on the school's foundation board.\n"In a profession such as medicine that changes as fast as it does, I am basically a perpetual student," Cast said. "Trying to keep education within reach of those who need it and practicing medicine to those who need it are basically two sides of the same problem"